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Hong Kong immigrants streaming out of Canada
May 18, 2013. 2:23 pm • Section: Immigration, The Search
Numerous studies for Metropolis, a Canadian government-funded immigration research body, report that many newcomers to Canada from Hong Kong (as well as from Taiwan and China) “never intended to stay.”
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Douglas Todd
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Just like thousands of compatriots who came to Canada from Hong Kong, Edward Shen has returned home.
The psychologist, who earned a PhD at Simon Fraser University, went back to his bustling East Asian homeland for reasons both familial and professional.
He is far from alone. Hong Kong-born Chinese people made up the predominant group of newcomers to Canada and Metro Vancouver in the 1990s. But since then, they have been leaving by the thousands each year.
One reason is family. Shen, who is a friend of mine, was among the first wave of Hong Kong arrivals to Vancouver, touching down here in the late-1980s. He became deeply involved in the life of the city.
However, Shen felt compelled to return to Hong Kong several years ago, in part to care for his aging mother. He also fell in love with a woman who lived in Hong Kong.
Another reason many people from Hong Kong have been returning home is money. Even though Shen had a busy psychotherapy practice in Vancouver of mostly ethnic Chinese patients, he is earning just as much working fewer hours in Hong Kong.
Still, Shen says the most common reason many Hong Kong residents have returned to their homeland from Canada is they have obtained what they believe is the “safety” of a foreign passport.
Says Ed Shen: “Most Hong Kong people know that there is no big money to be made in Canada, even less so in Vancouver. Vancouver in many people’s eyes is a place for retirement of rich people.”
Most Hong Kong residents immigrated to Canada in the decade before 1997, when the city of seven million residents officially became a “special administrative region” of the People’s Republic of China.
After 1997, when emigrants recognized China’s authoritarian regime was not imposing excessively Draconian restrictions on Hong Kong, many who had obtained Canadian passports began streaming back.
Statistics Canada’s numbers tell the tale. Despite Canada’s rapid population growth in the past 15 years, there are now 32,000 fewer Hong Kong-born residents in Canada than there were in 1996.
The 2011 National Household Survey, released last week, shows 209,000 Hong Kong-born residents in Canada (about one third of them living in Metro Vancouver). That compares to 241,000 who lived here in 1996.
Their total numbers in Canada have been dropping despite 1,000 to 2,000 new Hong Kong immigrants a year continuing to trickle in. Even accounting for deaths, it is clear that thousands of Hong Kong citizens each year have been leaving Canada.
Hong Kong now contains more than 350,000 residents holding Canadian citizenship, according to Vancouver lawyer Richard Kurland, editor-in-chief of Lexbase, a widely read publication on immigration policy.
The perspectives of Shen and Kurland are backed by scholarly studies.
Numerous studies for Metropolis, a federal government-funded immigration research body, report that many newcomers to Canada from Hong Kong (as well as from Taiwan and China) “never intended to stay.”
The Metropolis papers reveal a large portion of ethnic Chinese immigrants talk about being in “immigration prison” while in Vancouver, Toronto and elsewhere – enduring the three-year residency required to obtain a Canadian passport.
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Simon Fraser University researcher Nuowen Dang is among those who has found “citizenship acquisition is a key motivation” for people who move to Canada from Hong Kong.
That is true both for those who stay in Canada and those who return to Hong Kong, Dang writes. (It is true also of other East Asian immigrants, Dang added, including those from Taiwan and mainland China, the latter now being Canada’s top immigrant source country.)
The main factors drawing thousands to return to Hong Kong, Dang writes, are “higher-paying jobs, greater job security, job promotion opportunities and family reunification.”
And the outbound trend continues. “Many migrants,” Dang says, “do not plan to stay in Canada but rather invest in themselves for later movement” from country to country.”
Metropolis researchers Shibao Guo and Don DeVoretz found few ethnic Chinese people who departed from Canada “expressed regrets about leaving, suggesting that many of them had not intended to stay long-term.”
Even though Shen is one immigrant who did have strongly mixed feelings about leaving Vancouver to return to Hong Kong, his story reveals the powerful pull of family and finances.
“(In Hong Kong) I am perhaps working about 60 to 70 per cent of what I was in Vancouver, but saving up more than I used to, given the much lower tax rate (17 per cent flat tax),” Shen wrote in an email.
“Most Hong Kong people know that there is no big money to be made in Canada, even less so in Vancouver. Vancouver in many people’s eyes is a place for retirement of rich people, as they find the living standard in Vancouver very high. Which is true. People who want to make money choose Toronto over Vancouver.”
Kurland, the immigration lawyer, agrees that many immigrants from Hong Kong “who go back are tired of the high cost of living, including housing prices.” He adds that some “never fit in socially in Canada.”
As well, Kurland emphasizes many people from Hong Kong, as well as other ethnic Chinese immigrants, tend to see Canada as an “insurance passport,” a potential safe haven in case of crackdowns by the mainland Chinese government.
Echoing Shen, Kurland noted many Hong Kong returnees with Canadian passports are getting into the habit of visiting Vancouver from time to time, while harbouring hopes of eventually retiring here.
Many of Hong Kong’s well-off, educated residents, Kurland says, typify a new “international class of citizens” who have dual passports and can afford to migrate around the world to enhance their lifestyle.
Some want to “relax for a couple of months in Vancouver” during the summer when Hong Kong is “horrifically” hot, Kurland said. And, appreciating the West Coast’s clean air, some dream of peaceful retirement here.
Noted immigration specialist Richard Kurland says there is a potential danger for Canada in these global migration movements. The most crucial worry is: What happens if the ongoing clash of political wills between mainland China and Hong Kong blows up?
There is a potential danger for Canada in these global migration movements, however. The most crucial worry is: What happens if the ongoing clash of political wills between mainland China and Hong Kong blows up?
Kurland warns that the huge contingent of expatriate Canadians in Hong Kong would cause expensive problems for Canadian governments if China imposes more human-rights restrictions on its dependent region.
That, Kurland says, could cause hundreds of thousands of Hong Kong residents with Canadian passports to suddenly flood back to this country – where they would be immediately eligible for health care, education and other taxpayer-funded benefits.
Something similar happened before to Canada. When Lebanon became embroiled in a war with Israel in 2006, more than 50,000 residents of that country held Canadian passports.
Many hadn’t seen Canada in more than 20 years, Kurland says. But, since they had dual citizenship, we had an obligation to airlift thousands out of the war zone.
“They ended up having a Canadian vacation, paid for by Canadian tax dollars. And three months later, they were back in Lebanon,” says Kurland, who frequently appears before House of Commons immigration committees.
Even though it will likely not be a military conflict that pressures Hong Kong residents back to this country, Kurland says Canada could still experience “a mass emergency crunch.”
“If it goes badly between China and Hong Kong, you would see an extraordinary number of Hong Kong returnees” suddenly eligible for Canadian support services. “It’s an economic vulnerability for the country.”
Clearly, the issue of returnees to Hong Kong – to say nothing of all the immigrants who head home after obtaining a Canadian passport – has profound implications.
Not only for the returnees. But for the future social and economic well-being of Canada.
As Kurland says, “The Hong Kong story is not over.”
